Celebrating Christmas with the Urchins -- UPDATE -- SURPRISE

Let me explain how this trip came about. Mark and I booked our August trip in January and decided since we'd had such a wonderful time when we went last December for Mark's surprise 60th birthday trip, that we wanted to do it again. So we booked our trip for December 3 - 8.

Then I went on my girls' trip in June with Mary and her girls. One afternoon, I think we were at Epcot, Andy called to check in with me and he talked to Cayley. Shortly after that I called Mark to check in with him and Cayley got on the phone. Cayley asked Mr. Mark if she and her sister and her mom could go to Disney with us in December. Mary looked at me and thought it was a great idea. Mr. Mark said he thought it was a great idea, Mary checked with her hubby, Jeff, and we were on.

Mark hasn't seen the girls since September 2011 and will be surprised at how big they have both gotten.

Now I'll do a brief introduction and let you know our dates and where we are staying and then let Mary get her info up before we move on to daily plans.

First, there is me, your narrator/storyteller/woman who talks too much...however you want to look at it.

I am "Kat" of the KatMark. I'm 55 years old (soon to be 56); I've been married to my wonderful husband, Mark, for almost 30-1/2 years, the mother of two terrific sons and a "daughter" in-law. By day I am a legal secretary (although my main boss prefers to call me his administrative assistant...hey he's almost 88 years old and I've been with him 38 years so he can call me whatever he wants).

Me:

Then there is "Mark"...obviously the Mark of the KatMark. Mark is 60 (soon to be 61) going on 5 (especially when he is at Disney). By day, Mark is a salesman (well as of today he is...he might be out of a job at the end of the year); during the spring/summer by night and weekend days he is a baseball umpire...he does this to feed our love of Disney.

Mark:

Although they won't be on the trip, I'll give you a quick rundown on our kids. Andy is the oldest at 27, still lives with us and was recently appointed Head Varsity Baseball coach at a local high school; he is currently a computer aide, but will be a full-time substitute teacher, teaching English, when the current teacher goes on maternity leave. He has been dating Des for about 28 months. Mark is our youngest at 25 years old. He works for a subsidiary of John Deere and is also an assistant wrestling coach at a college in Dubuque, Iowa. Mark married our "daughter" this past June. Alisha is 22, beautiful and the apple of her father-in-law's eyes...she can do no wrong. Alisha works at a subsidiary of John Deere as well but in a different department. She will be going back to school in August and then, hopefully, making us grandparents.

Our children...

Andy and Des:

Mark and Alisha:

Mark and I with our handsome boys:

At this time, I would normally introduce the last member of our family. But, unfortunately, we lost our Princess Cookie on the 9th of this month at the age of almost 16. She was a large part of our family and we miss her dearly:

As I said earlier, we will be there December 3 - 8 and we will be staying at the Boardwalk Villas...a first for us.